the_mind_ - Slashdot User

Submission + - What Geeky Things Must Be Done? 2

Submitted by John on Tuesday November 27, 2007 @04:36PM

John writes: A few weeks ago, my friends were discussing "The Princess Bride", and most of the references went completely over my head — I've not seen it all the way through, nor read the book. Naturally, revealing this fact made these people look at me as if I'd just moved into town from under some rock. This led into a discussion of the things that most general geeks should be expected to know; for example, reciting the inscription on the One Ring, or (apparently) quoting "Princess Bride" on-demand. The suggestions we came up with ranged from personal things, like having one's movie/game library in an online database, to big, world-scoped things like contributing to an open-source project of your choosing. I'm curious to know what the general consensus is on the most obvious or biggest geek/nerd things that should be seen, done, or read/watched/heard.

FSF Releases AGPL License For Web Services 276

Posted by kdawson on Tuesday November 20, 2007 @12:55AM from the when-view-source-isn't-enough dept.

mako writes "The Free Software Foundation has released the Affero General Public license version 3. The license is essentially the GPLv3 with an added clause that requires that source code be distributed to users that interact with the application over a network. The license effectively extends copyright to Web applications. The new AGPL will have important effects for companies that, under the GPL, have no obligation to distribute changes to users on the Web. This release adds the license to the stable of official FSF licenses and is compatible with the GPLv3."

Submission + - Aussie Free-to-Air TV want to Nobble PVRs?

Submitted by RidcullyTheBrown on Monday November 19, 2007 @02:52AM

RidcullyTheBrown writes: The Sydney Morning Herald is reporting that Australian free-to-air broadcasters are about to start transmitting full EPGs. However, in return they want PVR makers to limit the ad-skipping features so they don't lose precious revenue. Manufacturers have said they can hardly modify products made for a global market just for Australia. A touch of arrogance in the broadcast networks who think they can dictate technology decisions of multinationals?

Submission + - Obama Pledges Support for Open Document Formats (consortiuminfo.org)

Submitted by

Andy Updegrove

on Saturday November 17, 2007 @01:19PM

Andy Updegrove writes: "ODF first made the headlines in Massachusetts when presidential hopeful Mitt Romney was its governor. Now, another presidential candidate has pledged his support for them as well. On November 14th, Barack Obama revealed his detailed IT plan for a more open and technically enabled government in a speech at Google's Mountainview campus. In that speech, he said: "It's no coincidence that one of the most secretive Administrations in history has favored special interests and pursued policies that could not stand up to sunlight. As President, I'll change that. I'll put government data online in universally accessible formats." In calling for open formats, Obama has introduced an IT hot potato into the presidential debate that has already riled the waters in multiple state legislatures and been the subject of heavy lobbying by vendors. Whether other candidates in general — and Mitt Romney in particular — will respond in kind or opt to keep their distance remains to be seen."

Submission + - Navisite Massively Botches Datacenter Move (navisite.com)

Submitted by

9InchRails

on Tuesday November 06, 2007 @02:45PM

9InchRails writes: "In a move to consolidate a newly acquired datacenter, web hosting provider Navisite shutdown, boxed and transported hundreds of servers, effectively stranding in excess of 200,000 web sites and authoritative name servers. This fiasco is in its fourth day as noted here and here. How could a company been so completely incompetent?"

Submission + - Australian Press Freedom Declining :Moss Report

Submitted by Anonymous Coward on Sunday November 04, 2007 @10:38PM

An anonymous reader writes: At http://www.abc.net.au/news/stories/2007/11/05/2081787.htm we read:

An independent audit by former New South Wales ombudsman Irene Moss has found a general "subtle shift" towards secrecy in Australia.
The audit reviewed legislation and practices related to free speech issues affecting the media in Australia.
Moss says Australians should not be complacent about declining media freedom.
"I observe a subtle shift, which shows we need to be vigilant," she said. "Although we enjoy tremendous democratic freedom by international standards, we shouldn't take it for granted."

The report was presented by the media coalition group called Right to Know, which includes the ABC. The group says it will use the report to pressure all levels of government to lift their game.

Related Link: State of free speech in Australia: http://www.abc.net.au/news/opinion/documents/files/20071105_righttoknow.pdf

Tags: industry, media, government-and-politics, australia

Submission + - Apple Sends 3rd Grader Cease And Desist Letter (cbs13.com)

Submitted by Arguendo on Wednesday October 31, 2007 @12:27PM

Arguendo writes: Apparently Apple needs to stop sending its fan mail to the legal department: "Like any nine-year-old, Shea O'Gorman spends a lot of time listening to her iPod Nano. So much so, that when her third grade class started learning about writing letters she thought, who better to write to than the man whose company makes her iPod." So she wrote Apple a letter, and Apple responded by telling her to stop sending ideas and, if you want to know why, take a look at our legal policy on our web site. Nice.

Submission + - Courageous Blogger Wins 1.5 Year Legal Battle! (fixyourthinking.com)

Submitted by

FixYourThinking

on Tuesday October 30, 2007 @09:21AM

FixYourThinking writes: "After nearly one and a half years of harassment from a relentless attorney, it seems that quietly a blogger in South Carolina has won a monumental ruling in favor of bloggers. In a summary judgement requested by the Defendant Philip Smith was able to obtain a special sanction after the Plaintiff attorney put a "notice of lien" (called lis pendens) on Smith's residence. The judge also reprimanded the Plaintiff attorney for abusive deposition and court procedure. The case set forth the following; "It's not the format; it's the content and intention that make text journalism / reporting""

Submission + - Upgrade Linux distros with bittorrent? 1

Submitted by jonathan3003 on Monday October 29, 2007 @05:59AM

jonathan3003 writes: I recently upgraded my laptop to Ubuntu 7.10. I had about a 1000 packages to download, and it took almost 24 hours (via a local mirror). It should be much faster than that. Why don't linux distros use apt-get (or rpm, yum, etc.) together with bittorrent? Surely with bittorrent technology now accepted as main-stream the mirroring system for package repositories can be replaced with a smarter system, where the load on the servers is reduced and download times are faster? A quick google search leads to some related projects, but why isn't there already a distribution with a file-sharing based package management system?

Submission + - The human race is likely to split into two races 5

Submitted by Colin Smith on Wednesday October 24, 2007 @08:44PM

Colin Smith writes: Humanity may split into two sub-species in 100,000 years' time as predicted by HG Wells, an expert has said. Evolutionary theorist Oliver Curry of the London School of Economics expects a genetic upper class and a dim-witted underclass to emerge.

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/uk/6057734.stm

Presumably most Slashdot readers are already in the process of evolving into Morlocks.

Submission + - Storm Worm Botnet Lobotomizing Anti-Virus Programs (eweek.com)

Submitted by

eweekhickins

on Wednesday October 24, 2007 @12:25PM

eweekhickins writes: "The ever-mutating, ever-stealthy Storm worm botnet is adding yet another trick to its vast repertoire: Instead of killing anti-virus products on target systems, it's now doing a hot fix with a memory patch to put resident AV products in a coma. The tack means that users won't be alarmed by their AV software not running. "It's running but brain dead. It's worse than shutting it off," noted ISS strategist Josh Corman. The technique also fools NAC (network access control) systems, which bar insecure clients from registering on a network by checking to see whether a client is running AV and whether it's patched."

Submission + - Thieves use Bluetooth to find laptops in cars (bluetoothlounge.com)

Submitted by

Alex C

on Wednesday October 24, 2007 @02:12AM

Alex C writes: "This is not the first time that I heard about people using the Bluetooth technology to get some advantage. The mobile phone technology is being used by thieves to seek out and steal laptops locked in cars in Cambridgeshire County, UK. Up-to-date mobiles often have Bluetooth technology, which allows other compatible devices, including laptops, to link up and exchange information, and log on to the internet. But thieves in Cambridge have cottoned on to an alternative use for the function, using it as a scanner which will let them know if another Bluetooth device is locked in a car boot. Det. Sgt Al Funge, from Cambridge's crime investigation unit, said: "There have been a number of instances of this new technology being used to identify cars which have valuable electronics, including laptops, inside". more...."

Submission + - Microsoft prepares tiny version of Vista (reghardware.co.uk)

Submitted by

Technical Writing Geek

on Monday October 22, 2007 @04:04PM

Technical Writing Geek writes: "An Asus spokesman told us Microsoft had already contacted the company to discuss the development of an Eee PC-friendly version of Vista, and today Asus announced that the Eee PC will soon be made available with an unspecified version of Windows pre-loaded. The tiny machines, with under 1 GHz processors and 2-8GB of solid state storage, have provoked Microsoft to produce this mini-Vista out of fear of Linux Eee dominance.

http://www.reghardware.co.uk/2007/10/22/asus_to_offer_vista_eee_pc/"

Submission + - Time to encrypt all P2P traffic? 3

Submitted by VORNAN-20 on Saturday October 20, 2007 @06:48PM

VORNAN-20 writes: Yesterday's item here about Comcast screwing around with P2P traffic brings up an idea. Is it time to change the P2P standard to encrypt all traffic? I think that almost any current PC would have no problem handling the extra load, and really, Comcast or any ISP has no business knowing what you are sending in the first place. I am not a network guy but I think that this is doable. If azureus, ktorrent, etc were all to come out with an "encrypt all packets using " option maybe this could be managed quickly and cleanly. It would be best to move quickly before all of the ISPs catch on to this. Come on developers, liberate us from the network meanies!!

Submission + - Ubuntu 7.10 (Gutsy Gibbon) Released (aviransplace.com) 1

Submitted by Aviran on Thursday October 18, 2007 @06:15AM

Aviran writes: Ubuntu, the most popular linux distribution is finally out with a new shiny version Ubuntu 7.10 (Gutsy Gibbon). The home page of Ubuntu.com is not updated yet but the release page is live and images of the Linux operation system are available for download.

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